Will the MINISTER OF HEALTH AND FAMILY WELFARE be pleased to state:
(a) whether the Government has any proposal to bring either Population Control Bill or new laws to control population of the country;
(b) so, the details thereof and if not, the reasons therefor;
(c) whether the Government has noticed that some State Governments, like Uttar Pradesh has started to enact such type of law, if so, the details thereof; and
(d) whether the Union Government will accord such laws?
ANSWER
THE MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH AND FAMILY WELFARE
(DR. BHARATI PRAVIN PAWAR)
(a) No such specific proposal is presently under consideration.
(b) A National Population Policy was formulated in the year 2000 with the long term objective of attaining Population Stabilization by 2045. Various Initiatives have been taken under the National Family Planning Programme providing broad range of services mentioned as given below:-
1. Mission Parivar Vikas has been introduced for substantially increasing access to contraceptives and family planning services in 146 high fertility districts in 7 high focus states.
2. Expanded Contraceptive Choices: The current contraceptive basket comprising of condoms, Combined oral contraceptive pills, Emergency contraceptive pills, Intrauterine contraceptive uterine device (IUCD) and Sterilization has been expanded with inclusion of new contraceptives namely Injectable contraceptive (Antara programme) and Centchroman (Chhaya).
3. Compensation scheme for sterilization acceptors which provides compensation for loss of wages to the beneficiary and also to the service provider team for conducting sterilisation.
4. Post-partum Intrauterine contraceptive device (PPIUCD) services are provided post delivery.
5. Scheme for Home Delivery of contraceptives by ASHAs at doorstep of beneficiaries has been taken up.
6. Scheme for provision of Pregnancy Testing Kits in the drug kits of ASHA for use in communities.
7. Family Planning Logistics Management Information System (FP-LMIS): dedicated software has been launched to ensure smooth forecasting, procurement and distribution of family planning commodities across all the levels of health facilities.
Achievement of the above initiatives are as follows:-
• The Total Fertility Rate has declined from 2.9 to 2.2 from 2005 to 2018 (SRS).
• 28 out of 36 States/UTs have already achieved the replacement level fertility of 2.1 or less.
• The Crude Birth Rate has declined from 23.8 to 20.0 from 2005 to 2018 (SRS).
• India’s Wanted Fertility Rate has come down to 1.8 in NFHS IV from 1.9 in NFHS III.
(c) & (d) It has come to the notice of Government that Government of Uttar Pradesh has prepared Population policy 2021-2030 with the objective of population stabilization and bringing down the Total Fertility Rate.
Population control comes under the Concurrent List of the Constitution, hence State Governments can enact legislation.